Wild As the Rest
by JDPhoenix
Summary: Wendy doesn't hear Peter's songs. Until the day she does.


**Disclaimer:** I own nothing but the actual story. Everything else belongs to people with a lot more power and money than I have.

* * *

><p>As one, the boys still, their ears tuned to a sound Wendy does not hear. It only lasts a moment before they are all up and spinning, leaping, dancing around the fire.<p>

Wendy's cracked nails dig into the rough bark of her log. They dance so close to the fire, the older boys going so far as to jump right over it. Though none of them have ever fallen in, she sees it every night in her imaginings and cannot bear to watch lest it actually come to pass. Instead her eyes fall on Peter, seated on his makeshift throne.

There are nights he joins the dance, as wild as the rest of them, but she never fears he will fall in. Perhaps she hopes for it in some dark corner of her heart, but she does not have to fear it. It would never end so simply as that, not even in Neverland.

His eyes meet hers over the pipes and she feels a chill run up her spine. He cannot read her mind, that much she knows for certain after all these years, but that doesn't stop her from worrying he might read her thoughts in her expression. If he does know her cruel hopes, he makes no move to punish her for it. His fingers continue to move unerringly over the pan flute - or she imagines they must be unerring with all the practice he has. She doesn't actually know because she has never heard the songs he plays.

And suddenly she hates him for that more than for anything else.

A thousand thousand nights on this island, nights where he plays for his boys but never for her. Never a song she can hear. It isn't her fault she's a girl.

All at once she cannot endure the boys dancing before her and instead turns in place on the log to climb off the back. She stomps into the jungle, angry at Peter, angry at Neverland, angry at herself for being angry at all. Behind her there is a brief lull in the footfalls, followed all at once by whoops of joy and stomping feet.

There is no running in the dense Neverland forest but Wendy makes a fair go of it. She wastes no time to push leaves and branches aside, letting their abuse fuel her anger instead. She stops when she can no longer hear the frenzied footfalls. Whether it is distance or her own ragged breathing blocking out the sound, she cannot tell. She curls amidst tree roots and buries her face in moss, telling herself it is dew she feels upon her cheeks.

It would be better if she were afraid. Peter's certain to be angry. Not because she ran - she goes off by herself often enough - but because she ran before the dance was ended and the boys had all gone to bed wherever exhaustion dropped them. She is supposed to _wait_. When the dance is done he sets his pipes aside and takes her by the hand and leads her to the tree house as if he were a proper young gentleman and she a proper young lady.

An angry, ragged laugh bounces off the tree and breaks over her face. She has serious doubts Peter could ever have been a gentleman and though she was once meant to be a lady, that's all gone now. It's a silly game and she can't find it in herself to worry over what he'll do. It can't be worse than being forever left out, forever shunted to the side simply because she's a girl.

She pushes her anger and hurt away and buries her face deeper into the curve of the tree.

It isn't sleeping so much as one moment her eyes are shut and the next they are drawn open again by a shift in the air. The night sounds are not quite so close as they were a moment ago. She uncurls herself from the tree and finds the landscape has changed around her. Now she sits at the edge of a clearing. This sort of geographical shift may be impossible back in her London, but in Neverland it is not so fantastic, especially considering the boy kneeling barely an arms length from her.

Peter's head is tilted as he considers her. He reminds her of the bird he always compares her to, so much so that she bites her lip to keep from laughing. His eyes land on her exposed teeth and her cheeks flame as she remembers her earlier fears that he can see her thoughts.

It is not wise to laugh at the Pan, especially when he is likely to be already angry with her. Maybe he won't punish her. Maybe he's simply come after her to finish the game. Does it really matter where they are when he takes her hand? And it would be just like him to surprise her, setting aside childish rage for a calm reminder that she has no power to alter his plans.

Her anger makes a reappearance and she trembles with the effort of holding back. What, precisely, she holds back she cannot say but it certainly stems from that dark corner of her heart, the one Peter takes such joy in cultivating. It involves brutality, she thinks. An open palm or a closed fist or perhaps the ragged edges of her nails. There would be blood then and the satisfaction she feels at the thought is not so disturbing as it should be. Peter may pretend all he likes but a thousand thousand nights on Neverland have well and truly ruined her for ever being a lady.

His head tilts even deeper as he regards her and his lips curl ever so slightly. It is a hesitant smile, not at all at home on Peter's face. Trepidation spurs Wendy's heart to beat faster and her limbs to go cold. An apology sits on the back of her tongue but she swallows it down. She has never apologized to Peter Pan and she never will. Whatever punishment has him so excited, she will not give him the added enjoyment of her pleas.

He pulls out his pipes and she is so startled it is not a knife or some such instrument of torture that for a moment she is struck dumb. He meets her eyes as he raises the instrument to his lips and she is even more shocked to see not only hesitation but _fear_ in them. The emotions are gone, chased away as quickly as they appeared. And then he plays.

The note, bright and clear, fills their little clearing. Wendy cannot help her smile at the sound. Peter's eyes crinkle with mirth and, spurred by her reaction, he plays on, faster. It is not the song the boys hear, she knows that much. No one would stomp their feet to this or hoot and holler. It is wild, but wild the way Neverland is. Grand and proud and fierce, like the song of some ancient king.

Wendy relaxes into the tree, her eyes fixed on Peter as he plays.

Low, brooding notes shape a fierce warrior, a rise to glory, an army raised. If the king in her mind has eyes that are too young and too old all at once, she passes over the detail quickly.

Brief, tense notes draw the lines of battle and she would almost swear she hears the clash of metal as the armies meet. But Peter is as much a storyteller as she is and knows better than to end things there.

A victory feast. Wine pours and glasses clink in long, trilling notes. Frantic bursts mark the arrival of dancers and entertainers. And underneath it all, slowly building, is something Wendy doesn't recognize until it takes over the song.

It begins light and gentle, just enough to draw attention away from the boisterous chaos of the feast, and just as it blocks all else out, it strengthens. It is its own kind of battle song but Wendy sees no armies in her mind.

Slowly the original tune weaves itself in, marrying the warrior's song with this one, matching the crowned king with…

Wendy turns her face slightly into the tree, though her eyes remain ever on Peter's face.

The song ends abruptly, in a way that promises there is more to tell. Peter breathes heavily. The song has run him ragged but his eyes are bright with triumph and eagerness, for what Wendy cannot guess. Perhaps for the rest of the song but she can tell even now that it, like Neverland, will never truly end. It is that sort of a song, that sort of a story.


End file.
